Fire At Midnight
by tielan
Summary: Fan the spark, kindled by the dying embers of another working day. [JohnTeyla]


**NOTES**: A pinch-hit for the John/Teyla ficathon on LiveJournal. The requestor (amitee) wanted 'something having to do with nature, maybe John and Teyla on the mainland. It doesn't have to be J/T relationshippy, I'm happy with friendship fic as well.'

**Fire At Midnight  
**

_I'll sit easy; fan the spark  
Kindled by the dying embers of another working day._

John rubbed his fingers over his scraped knuckles and glanced across the fire that had been built more for light than warmth. "You didn't say that hunting _hireni_ involved more than just hunting."

Teyla didn't look up from the hunk of meat she was slicing into thin strips and hanging on a frame of metal. "Did you not know what happens to the beast between when it is brought down and when it is prepared for your food?"

"Yeah, but generally, I try not to think about it," he said ruefully.

In the firelight's glow, her smile had a wry edge to it. "Now you know."

Now John knew a whole lot more than he was comfortable knowing about food preparation among the Athosians. Or food preparation in general - because he couldn't imagine that things changed that much from Earth to Athos. An animal for eating was still an animal, whether it was a cow or a _hireni_. "Atlantis isn't actually that bad on the processed food scale. Other than the MREs, of course."

Teyla glanced up, the edges of her smile lingering in the shadows. "It is not like the food of my childhood."

John indicated the slices of meat she was preparing for smoking. "If that's how the food of your childhood is prepared, then...no, it's not."

Out flashed the smile again, darkling dangerous. Her fingers were caramel-dark in the reddish light as they moved nimbly to avoid the sharp edge of the blade. Each cut slid past her fingers in a silvery flash, and she lifted the slice on the knife to the smoking frame in a gesture that was as familiar to her as cleaning a gun was to John.

The light slid across her face as she worked, the flickering intensity caressing the curves and angles of her face like a lover. John looked away before he was caught staring.

"Do you need more wood?"

"Yes, please."

He wasn't much of a woodsman, but John knew enough about axes to know how to wield one to turn a branch of wood into woodchips. His grandfather had owned a shack up in the Ozarks, years ago. The old man had been a recluse, and a crazy one at that, but he knew and did all kinds of things that a ten year-old boy found fascinating.

John had a feeling the crazy old man would have approved of a woman who knew how to skin and joint a _hireni_ in the space of an afternoon.

The crack-thud of the axe against the chopping block echoed in the warm air as John sliced the smokewood chunk into slivers, then hacked the green slivers into woodchips for tossing on the ember fires and smoking the _hireni_ meat.

Seasonally, New Athos was in its early summer - and it looked like it was going to be a hot one. Already, the temperatures were above what the Athosians considered 'normal' - the position of their settlement on New Athos was considerably closer to the equator than it had been on Athos or the Atlantean mainland, and the seasons were correspondingly warmer.

The murmuring river nearby would see some hard usage before the summer was out.

Teyla was just lifting the last sliver of meat to the frame when John returned with the chips. He put the metal grill on the embers, then waited for her to toss a handful of herbs on the coals before laying down the wood as she'd shown him earlier that evening.

Heat burned his hands and the grazes on his knuckles throbbed in answer, but he packed the kindling in layers until they were all gone and the thin, fine threads of smoke were beginning to wisp up from the bottom of the pan.

Teyla gave a quick smile of thanks as she lifted the frame over the smoking ember-pit and positioned it carefully into the small divets around the pit's edge. A teepee-like structure was placed carefully over it all, closing in the meat with the smoke.

Then she took up a bristled brush that hung from a nearby branch, and the metal tin of water that sat close by the fire, and began washing down the smooth cutting surface on which she'd sliced the meat.

Unsure of what to do now, John retreated back to his mulchy seat by the fire. "Do you miss this?" He asked after a moment of silence.

She paused in her scrubbing and glanced up at him. "This?"

He hadn't intended to address this. Not like this. In restlessness, his fingers brushed across the scrapes on his knuckles, the tactile sensation an alternative focus for his senses. "Your people. The things you used to do before you came to Atlantis." _Before we came along._

Teyla poured the last of the hot water from the tin over the wooden stump, and used the brush to sweep it off before she answered. "Sometimes. I miss the familiarity of life with my people." She paused again, hanging up the brush on the branch and stepping away to check the other teepee-covered smoking frames, laying a hand on the cover of each to test for the heat of the smoking fire beneath.

"I get the feeling they're not happy you decided to come back to Atlantis." John spoke carefully. He'd seen the looks the older adults gave him - men and women - as he walked into the camp beside Teyla. The children and most of the teens had seemed pleased to see him, but the adults had kept their distance, and Halling had been polite, but not as welcoming as he'd once been.

Leaves rustled on the ground as she moved to sit beside him, curling her arms around her knees as she drew her legs up against her. "It is...difficult."

John studied her face, shadows flickering across the lines and curves of her face. "It's your decision."

"It is what they see," Teyla said, a hint of regret in her voice. "They see me absent from them for days, weeks at a time. They go out through the Ring of the Ancestors and come back with the news of Wraith cullings among people we know. They see me grow distant from them, season by season, with nothing more than my words to speak of what I have done."

John had wondered about that sometimes. The Athosians had their prejudices, just as much as Atlantis. "They don't believe you're fighting the Wraith?"

"Some do," she said. "Others are less inclined to believe that we can succeed where the Ancestors failed." Teyla brushed a wisp of hair back from her face in an absent-minded gesture. "And after the Ancestors were defeated in their own city..." She trailed off. "It has been a long time since a leader of my people was away so long or so repeatedly; and what was tolerated at first is becoming less agreeable as time passes."

"Which is why you've been coming back to New Athos so often."

"Yes," she said, then hesitated. "Did you leave _nothing_ behind on Earth that had great value to you, John?"

John looked away from her too-clear gaze to stare at his hands. "Not really." Everything he treasured was here in Pegasus, from the woman who sat beside him, hugging her knees, to the city that gleamed on the water, a crown on the glittering blue jewel of the sea. But he didn't say that. "It's...different for me."

He'd been a loner most of his life - even before his tour in Afghanistan, he'd had lots of buddies, but few close friends. Even his failed marriage had been more of an attempt to find someone with whom he could _connect_ than a commitment to a woman with whom he wanted to spend his life.

"I will always miss my people," Teyla said as she reached up behind her to pull out her hair ties, letting her hair fall down around her face. "It is...comforting...to be where you feel at home."

John watched the light slick over her forearms as she finger-combed through her hair in rhythmic motion, and thought of six weeks in the SGC, stuck between worlds, going out with people who were strangers and remained strangers, and waiting for the signal that he and the others could come home. He thought of the days that dragged on without end, of the nights when the weight of the mountain over his head crushed him in his dreams.

He thought about two years in Atlantis, shuttling between the city and the mainland, fighting the Wraith on one hand and the expedition's prejudice on the other, of living in a world where she didn't belong, and only belonging when she came home for short visits - and probably not even then.

Even when Teyla came back to her people, she usually had someone tailing along behind her - John or Ronon, or one of the anthropologists - a constant reminder that things were different now.

"Hey," he said. "Next time, if you'd like to come back here - to New Athos - without someone following you around, you can just tell us to get lost..."

Teyla seemed surprised. "Your presence on New Athos is always welcome, John."

"Not to everyone."

"It is to me."

There was something reassuring about the way she made the statement, as though the opinions of her people didn't matter - although John knew they had to.

"All right. But if you want time away from us--"

"I will say." Teyla pushed back the curtain of her hair with one hand and peered out at him, amused. "I would say if I did not want you here."

He knew that. Most of the time. It was just that, sometimes, he wondered why she stayed. Okay, so he knew why she stayed. She wanted to see the Wraith destroyed, and she thought Atlantis was her best hope. It was the same reason Ronon stayed.

But Ronon didn't have anything or anyone else.

Teyla did.

John sometimes questioned if anything would keep her in Atlantis when the Wraith were destroyed, or if she'd walk away from the expedition without looking back.

It wasn't an obsession - it didn't fill every moment of every day. It was just that occasionally, in the quiet moments between one crisis and the next, John wondered.

But he never asked.

In the quiet that fell between them, something scuttled softly across the ground, and leaves rustled overhead as the river's murmur slid through the dark night. John tossed a fragment of twig into the fire and watched it flame up briefly in the dying fire as Teyla shifted in the shadows on the edge of his vision.

"Would you like to go swimming in the river?"

He paused in the act of tossing another twig on the fire. "Now?"

She'd risen to her feet. "When else?"

"I..." John stared at her, his mouth suddenly dry. "Uh, we don't have..."

"It would be skin-swimming," Teyla said, laughter gleaming in her eyes, shaping her voice, curving her mouth. "You need not join me if you wish to preserve your modesty."

It wasn't his _modesty_ he was worried about.

He'd seen Teyla in a variety of states of dress and undress; from the full formal regalia of some planet whose idea of a greeting ceremony rivalled a Presidential inauguration, to the very-skimpy tunics worn on a planet where the temperature hadaveraged 95 degrees in the shade.

Nakedness had not been one of those states.

Until now.

Of course, the sudden dryness in his mouth didn't stop him from taking the hand up she offered and following her down to the river. John might have some reservations - his dreams would probably be a little more explicit for a few weeks, possibly occasioning an inability to look her in the eye some mornings, but only an idiot would reject Teyla's invitation to go 'skin-swimming' as she called it.

John had to admit, skin-swimming sounded much more mature than skinny-dipping.

And it didn't have to be a big deal if he didn't make it out to be.

As they moved along the well-worn path down to the river, John concentrated on his location rather than on his companion. The moon rode high in the sky, its light dappling the groundcover and the bushes whose leaves brushed John's shirt with gentle fingertips.

"Careful," Teyla murmured as she made her way around a small, muddy puddle.

"You know this path pretty well," he said as he circumnavigated the water. "Been here often?"

"Some days before you returned to Pegasus, the weather was hot - unbearably so, even at night. It was not uncommon to come out here at night and find the swimming hole crowded."

"Did a lot of skin-swimming?" John asked casually as they reached the clearing where the scrub stopped and the bank ran down to the river.

Teyla had already crouched down to unlace her boots. "A little," she said, with a laughing note in her voice.

The faint lilt in her voice curled something in his stomach. Or maybe it was just seeing her tug off her boots and socks.

Her top didn't follow though - to his dismay. Instead, Teyla made her way over to the water's edge, still clothed. He didn't take off his boots, trusting to the solidity of their make to protect his toes from the lapping wet as he joined her down at the edge. "Not going to skin-swim after all?"

Moonlight gleamed pale across the black water, stark on the rocks and shrubs, brilliant along the curves and planes of her face. "Yes," she said. "Unless you have reconsidered?"

John had reconsidered. Several times. But the inflection of her voice made it a challenge and he'd never been one to step down from a challenge.

"I guess the last one in's a rotten egg," he told her, reaching for the collar of his shirt so he could haul it over his head.

Teyla turned towards him, catching his arm. "John..." Her fingers were cool on his skin, and he suddenly felt dizzy with the river's murmur, with the night's gentle warmth, with the way she looked at him, solemn and serious. She turned to face him, her feet swishing through the shallow water as she stepped in close to him. "I... There is something I have wished to do for some time..."

It was instinct that lowered his head to her raised mouth, lips touching lips with tentative care.

Teyla's hands slid up his forearms to rest on his biceps. His hands slid over her shoulders to cradle her throat. Her leg pressed against his, her ankle twining around the back of his foot as he lifted his head to check that this was okay with her.

The wide bow of her lips twitched into a smile.

Then she shoved him away.

Startled, John stumbled backwards, tripped over her foot, and landed in the shallows to the water's crash and Teyla's laughter.

She'd _ambushed_ him!

John floundered in the current, gasping for breath and revenge as her laughter rang out through the night. The water was brisk with a freshness that was enough to make him shiver as he found his feet.

He emerged from the water like a monster from the black lagoon, seeking prey. "You're going to pay for that, Teyla."

"John--" Teyla didn't fight and didn't run as he lunged and caught her up, a laughing armful as he spun on one still-booted toe and took her down into the river beneath him, fully clothed.

Her laughter vanished beneath the surface, a liquid burble on the edge of his underwater hearing as her feet thrashed, seeking solid ground. When she finally pushed herself up for air, he was pleased to see that she was in good spirits about it, still laughing as she inhaled too sharply and choked on a droplet of water.

John ran a hand through his sodden hair - one of the few times it sat flat - then pushed back the damp curtain of hers with one hand as she continued to choke and splutter. "You okay?" He asked as he supported her back with his arm.

She dragged in a deep breath, and didn't seem to notice she was almost sitting on him, her thighs stretched out over his lap. "I am fine." A few more coughs found their way out, her shoulders and back jerking against John's arm. "Perhaps a little short of breath."

Relived, John blew out a short snort as she took several gulps of air. "See, this is what happens when you try to drown your team-mate. You survive the Wraith for years and years, but choke to death on a river," he teased.

She poked him. "I am not dead yet, John"

"So it's just a flesh wound?"

Teyla's exasperation only made him smile harder. Back in the earliest days of the expedition, he and Ford had sat her down to watch the complete Monty Python. She'd come out of it with a somewhat twisted view of Earth humour. "I think it serves you right," he said.

"You were off-guard," Teyla countered without remorse. "It was a rare opportunity."

"I was off-guard only because you kissed me!" It had been a good kiss, too. John was miffed about that. A perfectly fine kiss that was nothing more than a blind.

In the darkness, her brow arched, glistening dark in the moonlight. "Do you not like being kissed?"

"I don't have a problem with being kissed," John retorted without thinking. "I have a problem when you're only doing it to trick me."

Her silence suggested that he'd let slip a little more than he intended. It was something of a habit where Teyla was concerned. He was suddenly glad of the night, and the way the moonlight drained colour from everything - it hid his flush.

"And I could not have meant the kiss since I took advantage of you while you were...occupied?"

John took a deep breath. "I can think of other...advantages I'd prefer you took," he said, deciding that the cloaking night, bleaching moonlight, and the unreality of their situation - sitting fully clothed in the middle of a river with Teyla almost on his lap - allowed for bluntness.

Even if his heart _was_ hammering against his chest and his stomach was twisting in on itself like a naked singularity.

Teyla was watching him, chin lifted, head tilted, a smile playing about her lips. "Such as?"

There was only one way John was going to answer that question.

John pulled one hand from the water and cupped her jaw. He leaned over slowly, to give her time to move away if she wanted. He didn't want to go further than she liked, or change anything she wasn't willing to change. With a bit of effort, they could excuse a few kisses and some skin-swimming - he was a reasonable, rational adult, after all - but the things John had in mind were of the 'no going back' kind. He wanted to be _sure_.

This time, he wasn't going to force her, he wasn't going to push himself on her, but neither was he going to back down. He'd do or be damned - terrifying as the thought was.

He did.

His lips brushed hers, tentative, testing, but Teyla was soft and still against his mouth. His stomach twisted in the grip of uncertainty, then loosened when she leaned into him. Tendrils of warmth slid through his body as she tested the shape and feel of his lips with her tongue, delicately tasting him, like he was a new flavour to be sampled and savoured. Her fingers were a cold caress against his throat, then a warm pressure as the kiss deepened.

Water eddied around them, tugging unheeded at the material of their clothes.

John slid a hand up to the nape of her neck, half-smiling at Teyla's response.

He let her kiss him, long enough and deep enough to be reassured that she was in this, too - no regrets.

Then he snaked the other hand over her collarbone so he had a firm grip on her, and tipped her backwards into the water.

Teyla came up spluttering - but at least not choking. John leaned over and kissed her again. "Now we're even."

Satisfaction curled in his belly as Teyla kissed him back briefly, before she drew away, scraped her hair back from her cheeks and sighed. "I suppose we are."

He watched as she clambered to her feet, staggering a little under the weight of her wet clothing, and held up one hand to steady her. In return, she helped him up, catching him when a rock turned under his foot. "Perhaps we should get out of these clothes," she said.

John was pretty sure she didn't mean it the way he interpreted it. But she _was_ going to understand the way he _wanted_ her to mean it. "I have no objections to getting you out of those clothes," he told her, and bit back a smile when she arched an eyebrow at him. "_You_ suggested skin-swimming."

"I did," she conceded. "John--"

"It's just swimming," he countered, refusing to be hurt by her hesitance. "Or don't you trust me?"

Teyla's eyes narrowed and she strode out of the river and up the bank to where she'd left her boots. Her movements were defiantly brisk as she began to undress - quite definitely _not _a strip tease - leaving John standing, knee-deep in the water, smiling to himself as he hauled his shirt over his head.

Whether this went somewhere or nowhere, John was going to sit back and enjoy the night.

_Build a little fire this midnight.  
It's good to be back home with you._

- **fin** -


End file.
